Twice the Fun, Half the Time

**日本語訳は英文記事の下をご覧ください**
“When you’re biracial, you get the best of both worlds. But there are also times when you’re neither here nor there; you don’t exactly belong to either one. I’m both Filipino and Japanese, although I grew up in the Philippines. When I’m in Japan, I’m seen as Filipino—in other words, I’m a ‘foreigner’ here. However, whenever I go to the Philippines, people treat me as a Japanese person. Sometimes it’s a good thing and sometimes it’s just hard to fit in. When people in Manila first meet me, they ask if I can speak Tagalog, which is funny because it’s my native tongue and they can hear me speak like a normal person. But they still wonder. I guess that’s just how we are as humans. We can’t process fast enough the contradictions in what we’re seeing and hearing.

I think the only thing we can do, as someone who’s bicultural, is to shine and do what we’re good at. Let the world know who we are and what we stand for. If a Japanese person can sing, I can sing in Japanese, too. If a Filipino person is good at cooking, I can cook, too.”